Massive Blast in Lebanon

Hmmm, that reminds me. Perhaps I should make use of that couple pounds of potassium nitrate I have stored in the garage. I bought it a couple years ago in order to make smoke bombs.
 
Interesting

A source close to a port employee said a team that inspected the material six months ago warned it could "blow up all of Beirut" if not removed, Reuters reported.

The head of Beirut port and the head of customs both said on Wednesday that several letters were sent to the judiciary asking for the dangerous material be removed, but no action was taken.

Port General Manager Hassan Koraytem told OTV the material had been put in a warehouse on a court order, adding that they knew then the material was dangerous but "not to this degree".

"We requested that it be re-exported but that did not happen. We leave it to the experts and those concerned to determine why," Badri Daher, director general of Lebanese Customs, told broadcaster LBCI.

Two documents seen by Reuters showed Lebanese Customs had asked the judiciary in 2016 and 2017 to request that the "concerned maritime agency" re-export or approve the sale of the ammonium nitrate, which had been removed from cargo vessel Rhosus and deposited in warehouse 12, to ensure port safety.

One document cited similar requests in 2014 and 2015.
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chrispy said:
I read that at least 6 letters had been sent on behalf of doing something about the load. If it at least that many letters, than someone (or someones), somewhere really ****** up.
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Either that or they had no viable options. Sending a sixth letter won't make a solution magically appear if it didn't exist prior to the other five letters.

Not only that, but the sixth letter doesn't even add anything new. Once they've read the first letter, they know what the issue is.
 
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chrispy said:
I read that at least 6 letters had been sent on behalf of doing something about the load. If it at least that many letters, than someone (or someones), somewhere really ****** up.
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I'm really interested in how this turns out. The latest assessment is that almost half of the metro area has suffered damage and some 300,000 people have been displaced. The populace is agitated, and the government is under serious pressure right now. I have read that as of today all of the port authority managers were placed on house arrest "while the situation is being investigated", with the implicit threat that those port managers are expected to be found responsible for the disaster. But if there's evidence that the port authority had been appealing for years to higher levels of the government to arrange for the cargo to be moved and being consistently blown off, then the port managers aren't actually guilty and are being scapegoated.
 
Checkmite said:
I'm really interested in how this turns out. The latest assessment is that almost half of the metro area has suffered damage and some 300,000 people have been displaced. The populace is agitated, and the government is under serious pressure right now. I have read that as of today all of the port authority managers were placed on house arrest "while the situation is being investigated", with the implicit threat that those port managers are expected to be found responsible for the disaster. But if there's evidence that the port authority had been appealing for years to higher levels of the government to arrange for the cargo to be moved and being consistently blown off, then the port managers aren't actually guilty and are being scapegoated.
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This is clearly the government's fault for not doing anything about it over all these years, and they seem to be looking for someone else to blame.
 
Lukraak_Sisser said:
I'd say incompetence / indifference is far more likely than nefarious conspiracies here.
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If that's the case, it was some epic, truly epic incompetence / indifference. Because the port authorities were writing letters begging the judiciary to have it re-exported for years.

Checkmite said:
Wow! That reminds me of the blast crater left by the Tianjin explosions.
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That incident happened just 5 years ago. It involved ammonium nitrate stored in a warehouse in a seaport. It should have been obvious at the time that there was a similar risk here.

Checkmite said:
Interesting
A source close to a port employee said a team that inspected the material six months ago warned it could "blow up all of Beirut" if not removed, Reuters reported.

The head of Beirut port and the head of customs both said on Wednesday that several letters were sent to the judiciary asking for the dangerous material be removed, but no action was taken.

Port General Manager Hassan Koraytem told OTV the material had been put in a warehouse on a court order, adding that they knew then the material was dangerous but "not to this degree".

"We requested that it be re-exported but that did not happen. We leave it to the experts and those concerned to determine why," Badri Daher, director general of Lebanese Customs, told broadcaster LBCI.

Two documents seen by Reuters showed Lebanese Customs had asked the judiciary in 2016 and 2017 to request that the "concerned maritime agency" re-export or approve the sale of the ammonium nitrate, which had been removed from cargo vessel Rhosus and deposited in warehouse 12, to ensure port safety.

One document cited similar requests in 2014 and 2015.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
chrispy said:
I read that at least 6 letters had been sent on behalf of doing something about the load. If it at least that many letters, than someone (or someones), somewhere really ****** up.
Click to expand...
Checkmite said:
I'm really interested in how this turns out. The latest assessment is that almost half of the metro area has suffered damage and some 300,000 people have been displaced. The populace is agitated, and the government is under serious pressure right now. I have read that as of today all of the port authority managers were placed on house arrest "while the situation is being investigated", with the implicit threat that those port managers are expected to be found responsible for the disaster. But if there's evidence that the port authority had been appealing for years to higher levels of the government to arrange for the cargo to be moved and being consistently blown off, then the port managers aren't actually guilty and are being scapegoated.
Click to expand...

I suppose it could be incompetence and indifference, but maybe someone with influence over the decision didn't want it moved out of the country because they had something else in mind. Something like "Hezbollah can possibly use this as a weapon against Israel". But not if it is re-exported or used to fertilize crops. So they kept it where it is and ignored the pleas to have it moved. I don't think it's a bizarre conspiracy theory. Granted, the incompetence / indifference hypothesis was my first theory too and it could be the correct one. But military groups like Hezbollah do like to stockpile weapons for future use, so that's not such an outlandish idea either.
 
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